Buena Vista Care Center — Santa Barbara, CA
This page sets out what the federal inspection record says about Buena Vista Care Center, a 150-bed nursing home at 160 South Patterson Avenue, Santa Barbara, California. Every figure below is copied from data the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) publishes about nursing homes that take Medicare or Medicaid. We have not added our own judgment to it.
The record at a glance
| Federal ID (CCN) | 555394 |
| Legal business name | Covenant Care California, LLC |
| Listed chain or group | Covenant Care |
| Address | 160 South Patterson Avenue, Santa Barbara, CA 93111 |
| Phone listed with CMS | (805) 964-4871 |
| Ownership type | For profit – Limited Liability company |
| Certified beds | 150 |
| Average residents per day | 120.3 |
| Certified since | November 20, 1989 |
| Overall CMS rating | 2 out of 5 |
| Health inspection rating | 2 out of 5 |
| Staffing rating | 3 out of 5 |
| Quality measures rating | 4 out of 5 |
| Total nursing staff turnover | 47.6% |
| Most recent standard inspection | April 10, 2026 |
CMS scores nursing homes from one to five stars. The health inspection rating is set relative to other nursing homes in the same state, so a one-star home is in the bottom fifth in California, not the bottom fifth nationally. Staffing and quality measure ratings are scored against national thresholds.
Inspectors have cited this home 22 times since January 2024
2 of those were at severity level G or above — what CMS calls actual harm. 1 reached immediate jeopardy, CMS’s most serious category. 13 came from complaints rather than routine inspections. Every one of them is listed below, with its date and what the rule required.
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Inspection citations since January 2024
CMS records 22 health citations at this facility from inspections between January 12, 2024 and April 10, 2026.
| Inspected | Tag | What the rule requires | Scope and severity | Status |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Apr 10, 2026 | F0812 | Procure food from sources approved or considered satisfactory and store, prepare, distribute and serve food in accordance with professional standards. | D — Isolated, Potential for more than minimal harm | Correction date May 4, 2026 |
| Apr 10, 2026 | F0805 | Ensure each resident receives and the facility provides food prepared in a form designed to meet individual needs. | D — Isolated, Potential for more than minimal harm | Correction date May 4, 2026 |
| Apr 10, 2026 | F0761 | Ensure drugs and biologicals used in the facility are labeled in accordance with currently accepted professional principles; and all drugs and biologicals must be stored in locked compartments, separately locked, compartments for controlled drugs. | D — Isolated, Potential for more than minimal harm | Correction date May 4, 2026 |
| Apr 10, 2026 | F0658 | Ensure services provided by the nursing facility meet professional standards of quality. | D — Isolated, Potential for more than minimal harm | Correction date May 4, 2026 |
| Jan 14, 2026 | F0656 | Develop and implement a complete care plan that meets all the resident’s needs, with timetables and actions that can be measured. (complaint) | D — Isolated, Potential for more than minimal harm | Correction date Jan 23, 2026 |
| Oct 20, 2025 | F0656 | Develop and implement a complete care plan that meets all the resident’s needs, with timetables and actions that can be measured. (complaint) | G — Isolated, Actual harm | Correction date Dec 15, 2025 |
| Oct 3, 2025 | F0689 | Ensure that a nursing home area is free from accident hazards and provides adequate supervision to prevent accidents. (complaint) | J — Isolated, Immediate jeopardy | Correction date Dec 17, 2025 |
| Oct 3, 2025 | F0908 | Keep all essential equipment working safely. (complaint) | E — Pattern, Potential for more than minimal harm | Correction date Dec 17, 2025 |
The wording in the third column is CMS’s own plain-language summary of the federal rule that was cited, not a description of what happened. This table shows every one of the 2 citations at actual-harm level or above, plus the 6 most recent of the rest. The other 14 are in the CMS file linked below.
How to read scope and severity
Every citation gets a letter from A to L. The letter carries two things at once: how serious the problem was, and how many residents it reached.
| Severity | Isolated | Pattern | Widespread |
|---|---|---|---|
| Immediate jeopardy to resident health or safety | J | K | L |
| Actual harm | G | H | I |
| No actual harm, potential for more than minimal harm | D | E | F |
| No actual harm, potential for minimal harm | A | B | C |
“Immediate jeopardy” is CMS’s term for a situation that has caused, or is likely to cause, serious injury, harm, impairment or death. It requires the home to act at once.
What this page does not tell you
- A citation is an inspector’s finding against a federal rule. It is not a court judgment, and the facility may be disputing it. Citations marked “under dispute” above are in CMS’s formal review process.
- Citation counts partly reflect how often a home was inspected and how many complaints were filed about it. A home with more citations has not automatically given worse care than one with fewer.
- Bigger homes have more residents, more staff and more inspections, so they tend to accumulate more citations.
- None of this says anything about the care any one resident received. A home with a clean record can still fail somebody, and a home with a bad record can be caring for your mother well.
- This is a snapshot. CMS updates these files monthly, and the figures here are from the file dated August 1, 2026.
Where this comes from
- Ratings, ownership, beds and penalties: CMS Provider Information dataset (4pq5-n9py), file dated August 1, 2026.
- Citations: CMS Health Deficiencies dataset (r5ix-sfxw), file dated August 1, 2026, filtered to inspections on or after January 1, 2024.
- This facility on the government’s own site: Medicare Care Compare.
- Retrieved August 29, 2026. Our method is set out in Editorial policy and How we count.
For the facility
If anything on this page is wrong, out of date or missing context, we will correct it. Buena Vista Care Center and anyone acting for it can reach the watchdog team through our corrections and right of reply page. We publish the response alongside the record.
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